Rodeo Dreams

by Sarah M. Anderson

  “A partnership?” Mitch said between slurps.

  “Yes. You and Travis both seem to think I need protection, and after last night, I’m not going to argue with that.” She couldn’t remember feeling as vulnerable as she had last night.

  “Okay...”

  “So,” she said, taking a deep breath, “I need a ride. A traveling partner. Someone who wouldn’t think I’m suggesting some other kind of partnership.”

  Mitch was watching her over the lid of his coffee. “What are you offering, June?”

  June again. At least he knew how serious she was. “It would be better if I had cover. If the other guys think I’m off the market, then the likes of Red won’t mess with me.”

  “Off the market?” Mitch shook his head, like he was doing a double take. Without even looking, June could feel the Brazilian bristling. “Like, a dating partnership?”

  “Not really. Just the illusion of a dating partnership. Listen.” This was it. All cards on the table. “I think you guys are a couple. And I don’t care.”

  Mitch looked at the Brazilian, who shrugged in defeat. Yeah, he’d known this was coming. But Mitch must not have. “You do? You don’t?”

  “Nope. Don’t care. But.”

  “But?”

  “Others might. You guys got careless and I busted you in a parking lot. No big deal. But someone else—anyone else—and it becomes a very big deal.”

  “Paulo thought you knew,” Mitch muttered into his coffee. Paulo nodded in agreement.

  “So I’m proposing a red-herring partnership. If everyone thinks we’re together, they leave me alone and they don’t suspect a thing about you two.”

  Paulo sat with his arms crossed, looking like the dentist had just informed him that his wisdom teeth had to come out right now and he was fresh out of anesthesia. Mitch took another slurp of the coffee.

  Should have let them wake up a little more. But she’d wanted to get it out there before she lost her nerve.

  “Look,” she went on, “we’re already doing this. You’re already buying me a shirt and working my ropes and dancing me around and kissing my forehead and buying me drinks that no one else knows is Sprite. That’s what you do. That’s your cover. I’m just saying we take it to the next level and give me cover, too.”

  “You have a point...but how would this work?”

  “Jeff and I take the backseat. We can get two rooms—most places have connected suites—Paulo and I can switch behind closed doors. I cover my own room, and we split everything else three ways. If money’s tight, I can sleep on the floor or out in the Bronco with the dog.”

  She thought she heard Paulo growl at her, not unlike how Jeff held his displeasure in his throat. Mitch must have heard it, too, because his back stiffened.

  “Please, guys. This is my only option. I don’t have the money to get the car fixed or get a replacement. If I can’t travel with you two, then I have to pack it in and go home. Done before I even get started. And everyone will say it’s because I couldn’t cut it, because I couldn’t ride—not because my damn car caught fire.” She didn’t know what would be worse—knowing what the riders on the circuit would say after she left or facing people at home who thought she’d been stupid to try. Even though her dad was locked up, the news would still trickle down to him and he’d think he was right.

  The idea burned the back of her throat. She wouldn’t admit defeat. Not now. Not when she could get on another bull tonight.

  “But why us? Because you can blackmail us?”

  “This is not blackmail, Mitch. Even if I have to leave, I wouldn’t say a darned thing to anyone. I’m not that kind of woman.” She sighed in frustration. After all her rehearsing, she wasn’t doing a decent job of explaining her point. “And I don’t trust anyone else, that’s why.”

  Paulo made a sound that had to be Portuguese for “Hmph.” Mitch shot him a warning glance as he tried to find an easy way out of what she was proposing. “Try Travis. He wouldn’t let anything bad happen to you.”

  “His idea of not letting anything bad happen to me would be buying me a ticket home and making sure I got on the plane and you know it,” she snapped. “I’m trying to find a way to ride next week, Mitch. I’ve got bills to pay and if I can’t ride, I don’t know what I’ll do.” Another winter with another unpaid heating bill was unthinkable. Hell was freezing to death in your own house.

  The men looked at her like maybe they didn’t believe her. She took a deep breath and pulled back. She needed to be calm. “I don’t want a three-way love triangle, Paulo, I really don’t. All our interests could be served if people were under the wrong impression, that’s all.”

  Mitch was sitting cross-legged on the floor, wearing his white undershirt and the sheet. He didn’t even have his glasses on. The confusion on his face made him look as vulnerable as she felt, but she had no other options. It was either “date” Mitch or go home.

  Paulo looked like he was going to glare her to death. He sat there, arms crossed in defiance. His leg was nervously jumping.

  Yeah, Paulo and Mitch needed to talk about it.

  “I’ve got to get Jeff the last bagels and get him out of the Bronco,” she said, pulling on her running shoes. A good run would clear her head, as well. “You guys think about it. Besides,” she added at the door, “if I’m your cover, then I could beat up the Bobbi Jeans of the world before they got the chance to hose you down in iced coffee.”

  She took Mitch’s laugh behind her as a good sign.

  * * *

  TRAVIS SAT IN the booth at a local diner, debating whether he wanted breakfast or lunch. He liked finding these dives where old farts spent long mornings arguing who had the better batting average in 1965 under the watchful eye of a waitress who’d been here long enough to set them straight.

  “What’ll you have, hon?” a vintage woman with a vintage pair of glasses asked as the bell over the door jingled again. Another old man in Bermuda shorts and black socks bellied up to the counter, where he blended in with the crowd.

  No matter where Travis went or how famous he wasn’t, he was always “hon” in a place like this. “What’s the house special?”

  “Biscuits made fresh this morning,” she replied without looking up. “Best gravy in the state.”

  Biscuits and gravy. Homecoming on a plate. “Extra gravy, okay?” he said with a wink.

  The waitress rolled her eyes at his cheekiness, but in short order, a plate mounded with biscuits and an extra bowl of gravy was before him.

  The moment the salt-fat goodness of sausage gravy done right hit his tongue, Travis was in another world.

  Bittersweet homecoming on a plate.

  Before the lung cancer, Mom had taught Home Ec at his high school. She’d made the best damn biscuits he’d ever tasted, a fact he hadn’t appreciated until it was way too late. She hadn’t lived to see him graduate. Although he knew she wouldn’t approve of him riding bulls, he still wished she could have seen him ride. Even just once.

  “More coffee, hon?”

  The waitress was staring at him over her glasses, pot in hand, expecting a normal response. “Oh—yes. Please,” he said, shaking off the stranglehold the past had on him.

  “How are the biscuits?”

  “Almost as good as Mom’s,” he said.

  The door jingled again. Desperate to stay in the present, where a mere plate of biscuits and gravy didn’t bring a grown man to his teenaged knees, Travis looked up.

  Just in time to see Mitch waltz in, holding the hand of a young woman—

  With long black hair and rust-red boots.

  Crap.

  “Travis!” Mitch was headed straight for him, his hand still woven together with June’s. She looked different—was she wearing makeup?

  “Hey,” Travis managed to get
out without choking on his fork.

  Mitch took that as an invitation and slid into the booth, pulling June down next to him and draping his arm around her shoulders—after carefully moving her long ponytail out of the way.

  Crap.

  “What’s good here?” Mitch asked as the Brazilian slid in next to Travis.

  What’s good here had been the solitude, but it was long gone. Travis knew he should say something, but all he could do was stare as Mitch leaned over and, eyes still on the menu, kissed June’s head.

  Crap.

  What the hell had happened? She’d left the bar alone last night, of that much he was certain. He’d followed her out into the parking lot to make sure no one had been lying in wait. The only other thing out there had been that hellhound. But there was no mistaking it today. The Heartbreak Kid had staked his claim.

  June raised her eyes slowly until they met his. There was a hint of challenge in them, like she was daring him to call her out on the hookup with Mitch. “Are the biscuits and gravy any good?”

  Finally, something he could say without grimacing. “Almost as good as Mom’s,” he repeated, staring at the half-eaten plate. Damn, but he hated Florida.

  “Your mom must be a better cook than mine,” she said, giving him a small smile.

  “Was. She’s dead.”

  That was one way to kill a conversation. The whole table froze.

  Finally, after a pause that was the definition of awkward, June scooted out of the booth. “Mitch, be a dear and order me the Denver omelet,” she said as she got up. “I’ll be right back.”

  At least this would give Travis the chance to find out what had changed between midnight last night and noon today.

  “Sure thing, Girlie!” Mitch twisted around in the booth to watch her walk away.

  Travis already knew what she looked like walking away and he was in no mood to appreciate the sight. This was exactly what he hadn’t wanted to happen. The Heartbreak Kid would break her heart, all right.

  The fact that he cared bothered him even more. His shoulder began to ache. He had to stop letting that woman distract him before it threw off his whole game.

  “I told you not to mess with her,” he hissed as soon as June was out of earshot.

  “I got news for you,” Mitch said, keeping his eyes on her retreating figure until she rounded a corner, “she called me.”

  “What?” Half the restaurant turned to stare at him. Travis resolved to keep his volume down.

  “It’s true. Seems she ran into a spot of trouble at this dump she was staying at, and ol’ Mitch was the first in her phone tree.”

  The waitress appeared with more coffee. “I’ll have the Farmer’s Special, the lady will take the Denver omelet and the gentleman will have the pancakes,” Mitch said, oblivious to anything but food.

  “Bull crap.”

  “Seriously. Someone jacked her car. It was a causality of the event. She would have called you, but...” He shrugged, enjoying pouring lemon juice into Travis’s paper cut. “She didn’t have your number and she was afraid you’d send her home. So she called me and, well...” That smile said Mitch had snagged the last cookie from the jar before anyone else had the chance. “You know how it is. One thing led to another.”

  Oh, he knew. Mitch in action was a force no woman could resist. “What about the Brazilian? I thought you two were traveling buddies!” Like that had ever stopped Mitch before, but it was all Travis had to go on.

  “Aw, he don’t mind sharing a ride,” Mitch said with a casual shrug. “But I think he’ll be getting his own room from here on out.”

  Travis’s stomach turned hard. This was wrong on every level. If she wasn’t smart enough to wear a helmet, why did he think she’d be smart enough to see Mitch for what he really was? Maybe Travis had figured her wrong. Maybe he’d figured everything wrong.

  Worse was his next thought. What if, instead of Mitch using her, she was using him? After all, this was the same woman who’d tried to trick Travis with her body in a fight that first night. It was possible that she was sinking her claws into Mitch because Mitch was easy.

  He heard her before he saw her, the heels from her boots tap-tap-tapping on the linoleum. “Miss me?” She turned her big black eyes up to Mitch like he was the man of her dreams.

  “You know I did,” he replied, running a finger down her face real slow. June blushed, the deep pink tingeing her brown cheeks with a glow that she wasn’t faking.

  Travis didn’t hear the rest of the lopsided conversation. All he could do was watch as June smiled at Mitch adoringly and Mitch touched her like, well, like he’d already touched everything.

  Crap.

  Travis hated Florida.

  * * *

  “THAT WENT WELL.” Mitch flopped facedown on the bed that she was ostensibly sharing with him tonight.

  “If you mean Travis is one small step from killing both of us, then yeah, it went well,” she agreed from the other side of the room. Safer over here, far away from Mitch’s mixed signals and Paulo’s unhappy glares. “Tell me again why he thinks you’re such trouble?”

  “You met Bobbi Jean, right? But not—who was it down here—Norma?” Paulo nodded from his position at the foot of the bed.

  “One in every state? That’s a lot of flirting.”

  No wonder Travis thought the Heartbreak Kid was trouble. The way he’d looked at her as he finished his biscuits had cut her colder than Tunkashila Tate’—Grandfather Wind—ever had in the dark of the South Dakota winter. Eyes burning, jaw twitching beneath that ten-day-old beard he kept neatly trimmed—that look had said what his mouth hadn’t. He knew that, between the bulls and the man, she was throwing her life away. Only a damn fool would think that Mitch could give her what she needed.

  If only Travis knew how right he was.

  She tried to stay positive. If Travis was buying their act, everyone else would, too. This was part of the game, right? Convincing everyone that she was taken and Mitch was straight?

  But no matter how she framed her congratulations for a job well done, it sat sour. Just like Travis’s silent departure. He couldn’t even look at her. Despite the fact that he’d been nothing but pissed at her since day one, she kind of liked it when he looked at her.

  And it wasn’t just the way he looked in chaps that made her feel that way. He’d bought her that rosin, after all. He’d pulled her ropes. In his pigheaded way, he was keeping her safe.

  “Actually,” Mitch said, his voice muffled by the bedspread, “as long as Travis doesn’t wring our necks, I like how this is going to play out. I tell you, it’s exhausting to string along a whole bunch of women who are never going to meet my momma. This will be better.”

  Better for everyone.

  Except Travis, an irritating little voice in her head whispered.

  She pushed back against that thought. No, Travis was not her problem. She could not let her crush distract her. She was just doing what she had to do to get on a bull tonight. And since Travis was first in a long line of people who wanted her off the bulls, she was completely justified in throwing her lot in with Mitch.

  Paulo sat down, his hand close to—but not touching—Mitch’s leg. She felt like she was intruding again so she quickly changed out of her boots and into her running shoes. “Tomorrow, we’ll get separate rooms,” she promised as she laced up.

  “We go to whatever Methodist church is around on Sunday morning,” Mitch said, already sounding half-asleep.

  “Really?” The question was out before she could stop it.

  Paulo shot her a look that said well, yeah, as Mitch snorted. “My momma didn’t raise heathens. We go to church.”

  Not negotiable. Well, June had heard Methodists were nice enough folk. If church was what it took, then that’s what she’d do. “Not a pr
oblem.”

  “Probably going to spend another day down here and hit the Mouse House again.”

  Mitch and Paulo did well at the rodeos, but she found herself wondering how they were able to afford sightseeing and not hold any other jobs besides riding on the weekend. There’d be time enough in the Bronco to find out that sort of thing.

  “That’s fine. I’m sure there’s a library around here somewhere—I’ve got a lot of reading to do.”

  “So we’ll leave for South Carolina Tuesday morning?”

  “Agreed.” History papers didn’t write themselves, and the chances of another rider spotting her in a library were so slim as to be laughable.

  This was all going to play out. She was going to ride; she wasn’t going to have to worry about Red or thugs in the dark; and she was going to be a good cover for Mitch and Paulo. As soon as she started bringing in some money, things would be great. Perfect. It didn’t matter what Travis Younkin thought. She wasn’t going to let him or his overprotective attitude stand in her way. She was in charge of her own destiny, by God. This was her life and she was doing exactly what she wanted with it.

  As long as she kept telling herself that, it was bound to feel right. It was all going to work.

  June had faith.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  “MORE,” SHE SAID, her voice thick with concentration.

  Focusing on keeping his balance, Travis pulled with all his might. If he used his right side as the pivot point, he could get the kind of tension she needed. Because the woman needed a lot of tension. “Good?”

  She nodded as she took the tail end of her rope from him, wrapped it around her handle and tested her grip. Satisfied, she scooted up on the bull until her hips were in the right spot and looked up at him. “Thanks,” she whispered, her big doe eyes latching onto his with something that Travis could only guess was adrenaline intoxication.

  The kind of look that made him sweat with its intensity, but thankfully, the moment passed quickly as she turned to Mitch and smiled. Mitch was holding her steady as Brother-In-Law threw his weight from one side of the chute to the next.